In the Wee Small Hours
by astudyinfic
Summary: Even after three years, John still has trouble with Sherlock's sleep schedule sometimes. And sometimes it is no problem at all.


Long before they even became lovers, John knew that Sherlock's sleeping habits were erratic at best. For days, he would run on no sleep at all before collapsing on the nearest flat surface to sleep for 18 hours. On a number of occasions, John dragged his unconscious form to bed, just to get him out of the hallway or off the stairs.

Nowadays, on most nights, John considers himself lucky if Sherlock falls asleep with him in the evenings or wakes up with him in the morning. He can count on one hand the number of times that both had happened in the same night. And while he is pleased that Sherlock is getting some amount of sleep every night, he can't help but wish for a little more.

One night, after a cup of tea and a few old episodes of QI, John's eyes refused to stay open any longer. Dragging himself to his feet, he stumbled to the kitchen where his spouse was hunched over a microscope, peering into a petri dish.

"Coming to bed, love?" John asked, running his fingers through the inky curls at the top of the detective's head.

"Not now, John!" Sherlock growled, sounding put out at the interruption. "The slime mold is at a crucial stage of it's development."

Perhaps Sherlock was more in touch with John's feelings than he realized, or perhaps it was the small, defeated sigh that emanated from the doctor, but he reached out, grabbing his lover by the wrist before he could leave the room.

"I'm sorry. I'll be in soon, okay? I love you." He tugged John closer, pulling him down for a sweet, almost chaste kiss, before returning to the microscope.

"I love you too," John said, his smile quickly turning to a yawn as he shuffled his way to their bedroom. "Don't stay up too late," he called down the hall before shutting the door behind him.

He discarded his clothes in the hamper before crawling into bed in only the worn grey cotton boxer briefs that he continued to wear just to annoy his husband. (Sherlock insisted on buying him "less dull" pants. His drawer was full of red ones, silk ones, even one with bees on them, but he still chose the basic grey, just to be difficult.)

John's eyes closed the second his head hit the pillow and he slept the sleep of the truly exhausted. They had been without a case for a few days, and just sitting around the flat wore him out much more than running the back streets of London ever did. It was several hours before he even moved again.

Sherlock was pleased. The slime mold experiment had been successful. He had shown that the chitosan powder was detrimental to slime mold growth. Maybe next he would move onto more complicated organisms.

Glancing at the clock, he sighed as he realized almost four hours had passed since John went to bed. Time always did seem to get away from him. Making sure the slime mold wouldn't migrate to the jam jar or anything while he slept, he switched the lights off as he followed John's path to the bedroom.

The room was mostly dark, only softly illuminated by the glow of the street lights out on Baker Street. In the orange sodium haze, John looked almost ethereal to Sherlock's eyes. He lay on his stomach, one hand under the pillow, the other thrown haphazardly over his head. The blanket had bunched down around his waist while he slept, giving Sherlock a clear view of his broad back. His back was paler than his neck and arms, contrasting dramatically with the pinkish skin of the scar on his shoulder, but he still maintained some of the golden hue from shirtless days in the desert sun. When they were wrapped around each other Sherlock often marveled at the difference in their skin tones. The cool and the warm, it was very nearly poetic.

As he undressed, leaving his clothes piled on the floor, which John was certain to comment on in the morning, he marveled at how he very nearly missed out on all of this. When he had invited John back to 221B three years ago, it had been as a means to an end. While he wanted the flat he would not have been able to afford it on his own, with Mycroft having control of his trust fund after his run ins with Lestrade in those early years. John could pay part of the rent until his consulting detective business took off, then he would no longer be needed.

That had been the plan anyway. It had taken less than 24 hours for Sherlock to realize just how important John Watson was going to be in his life. It had taken just under a year for them to fall in love, though it had to be pointed out to them by The Woman. And 6 months after that, they married. Neither could remember who had proposed to whom, but once they realized how they felt, there was never any question of what would follow.

To think he had gone from someone who had no friends and no use for other human beings to a happily married man in just 18 months never failed to make him smile. It may have been a Holmes family motto that "Caring is not an advantage," but he now knew that to be untrue. John and his feelings for him had been an advantage several times, many more than it even worked against them.

Sliding in to bed, he knew he should let the man sleep, but he was overwhelmed by love (and yes, lust) for the man who had opened his eyes in so many ways. His fingertips ghosted over the scar that, in a way, had brought John into his life. From there he traced over the shoulder blade then slowly down the doctor's spine, counting each vertebrae as he went. Knowing he was pressing his luck, but continuing anyway, mostly because he was Sherlock Holmes-Watson and when did he ever do what was proper, he rolled over so he was half on his sleeping husband's back, and pressed wet, open mouthed kisses below each shoulder blade, tongue lapping out to taste the taut skin beneath his lips.

"Unh," came a groan of half arousal and half exhaustion from John. Sherlock pulled away in an effort to allow him to go back to sleep.

"No…don't stop. Feels good," came a sleepy response from somewhere in the pillow, muffled almost to the point of being unintelligible.

Sherlock's hands slid down John's side as his mouth found his neck. Tilting his head to the side to give Sherlock more access, he squirmed slightly, trying to twist around in the embrace. When he finally succeeded, his arms snaked up around his husband's neck, pulling him down for a leisurely kiss. Even in his sleep addled mind, John couldn't help being amazed at how soft and smooth Sherlock's tongue felt against his, how their lips fit together like two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle or how the man always, ALWAYS tasted slightly like cinnamon on top of his more Sherlocky flavor.

"'Llo," he greeted sleepily, smiling that brilliant smile that made Sherlock's breath catch and his brain stop momentarily. "Finally decided to come to bed, then?"

"Yes, but now that I'm here, I've found something much more interesting to do than sleep," he quipped. How could one man be so adorable while still half asleep, Sherlock mused silently, grinning as John's eyes started to shut again, a half smile still on his face.

Sherlock's head dipped, catching John's mouth to pull him out of the sleepy haze. Arms wrapping tighter around each other, they both gasped as their erections rubbed together, legs entwined until no space was left between them.

Sherlock smirked against John's lips. "I see you find my plan agreeable," he joked as he bucked his hips, causing jolts of pleasurable electricity to shoot through both of them. As John's hips pushed upward in response, Sherlock's hands quickly slid his pants over his arse, freeing his cock a moment later. "I don't know why you insist on wearing these dull things," he murmured.

Rolling on top of his husband, Sherlock kissed him deeply as John's hands came up to cup his face, sliding over the light stubble that had appeared there over the course of the day. The guttural moan that escaped John as Sherlock shifted to slide his hand between them, caused heat to pool at the base of his spine and he started pumping them both within his large grip.

"Fuck…yes," John gasped between kisses. "More, Sherlock. I need you inside me." Never breaking the kiss, John groped blindly for the lube that they kept on the night stand, pressing it into Sherlock's hand, both sighing slightly as he released his grip.

Lubing his fingers, he slid down his lover's body, ghosting over various scars, the cause of which he could name for each and every one. Sherlock knew the body under him better than he knew his own, and the same could be said for John. Dual sensations hit John as Sherlock engulfed him with his mouth while breaching him with a finger.

"Christ, so good," he exclaimed, arching up into the mouth while trying to push down on the finger, all traces of sleep well and truly gone. Sherlock hummed his approval while adding a second finger, scissoring them gently to get him ready.

After a third finger, they both knew it was time, and John lifted his knees towards his chest to give Sherlock better access, but his husband gently pushed them back down.

"No, no. Like this," he whispered, grasping John's hip to roll him to his side, facing away. Slowly, Sherlock entered him, wrapping his arms around the smaller man who was his entire world. Pausing a moment, they both adjusted, John to the sensation of being filled with Sherlock physically as well as emotionally and Sherlock to get over the overwhelming feeling of _hot-wet-tight-JOHN._

Slowly he began rocking his hips, the only sounds in the darkened room, the small moans that elicited from each man and the occasional kiss as Sherlock pressed his lips to every part of John he could reach. After several minutes, he began whispering, pulling John in even tighter so his mouth could be directly over his husband's ear.

"You, John Holmes-Watson, are everything to me. You are the best game, the most complicated puzzle, and the most confusing crime scene. You are better than slime molds on the table, heads in the fridge, and feet in the bread box. You are the sun that my planet orbits around." John's head turned so they could meet in a slow, sensual kiss.

Eventually, his thrusts became more erratic, and he reached around to stroke John's cock in counterpoint to his hip's movements.

"Come for me," he breathed, biting at the junction between the neck and shoulder.

John shuddered his release over his stomach and Sherlock's hand, the contractions of his body pulling Sherlock over the edge as well.

"We should clean up," John mumbled, already half asleep again.

"Do not even think about moving," Sherlock growled, his softening erection slipping from John's body. "We can clean up in the morning."

John knew he should argue, that it would be ten times worse in the morning, but he was so comfortable and sated, he couldn't bring himself to do it. Instead, he snuggled back against Sherlock in his embrace, whispering, "Good night, love. Please sleep," as he drifted off.

Sherlock pressed his face into the sandy colored hair at the back of his head, muttering, "I love you, too," as he also succumbed to sleep, just as the sun peaked over the horizon.


End file.
